Off the Chain program gives troubled youths a second chance

Kids can end up at the Dooley Center for Alternative Education for a lot of reasons.

Currently in the foster-care system, Kahlil S., 14, has attended several schools in the past few years. With soft brown eyes and a quiet voice, he hardly seems threatening, but he was kicked out of a Henrico County school for bringing a knife to school and threatening a classmate. He regrets it.

"Every day, kids come in my office and cry," said Ron Hansboro, the school's director.

But Hansboro says the world is a bigger -- and better -- place than some of the places they've lived. He wants them to realize it, too and to learn to lead productive lives.

Just over a year ago, the school, part of the St. Joseph's Villa complex off Brook Road in Henrico, implemented Off the Chain, a program Hansboro created to address some of the reasons the program's 41 high school students may have acted out in violence, broken the law and been unsuccessful in school.

Off the Chain is so named because it describes the program's effort to break the cycle of poverty, drug abuse, homelessness and crime.

On Tuesday, students scrambled under an overpass to see how a colony of the area's homeless live, with stained mattresses and makeshift facilities. They've been to abandoned houses and watched drug addicts flee.

"It would be easy to have a counselor . . . come in and tell them not to do drugs," Hansboro said. "But this is going to show them what can happen and make them ask themselves, 'OK, what am I going to do with my life?'"

Community service is a requirement in Off the Chain. Dooley Center students work with animals at the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, help refugees learn English, work at a food bank, and play games with the elderly at a veterans' center.

"It is a learning experience," said Darlisha D., 16. "It shows us other things that are out there. It makes you want to help people."

Hansboro said the students have warmed to the experiences of assisting those in need. Some, like Jasmine T., 15, have requested to return and volunteer on their own time.

Jasmine said she enjoys working with the elderly and might like to be a nurse.

Hansboro says the results of the unorthodox program are tangible.

"A lot of them are making honor roll for the first time ever. They're earning it," he said.

The need for physical restraint of students has decreased significantly. When he arrived four years ago, Hansboro said two or three incidents a week was the norm. "Last year, after the program started, we saw a big drop. We had maybe five all year."

Hansboro sees his students as nonconformists rather than inherently bad.

And most, he said, understand the importance of school.

"When we had these kids define poverty, they said it was a lack of education," he said. "Many of them haven't been educated because people won't take the time to teach them."

Off the Chain can't change the situations the students face at home. On parent/teacher conference day, one parent showed up.

But it can help them find the strength to avoid conflict and stay out of trouble.

"At [her former] school, I was fighting all the time, not caring," said Jasmine, who's in her second year in the program.

"This has made me open my eyes and realize that you can't treat people bad. I'm trying to stay out of trouble. I think I've figured it out now.

Her contentious relationship with her mother has improved, too. "My mom is happier now, because before I was the kind of girl who got in a lot of trouble."

Contact Lisa Crutchfield at (804) 649-6362 or .